France condemns Boko Haram kidnap video as 'cruelty without bounds'

Jean-Marc Ayrault, French Prime Minister, said the kidnappers "display a cruelty without bounds".

"For all of us, these images are terribly shocking. The video tape ... is being studied by our (intelligence) services, who are examining precisely the nature of these claims," he said.

The three-minute video, posted to YouTube and mentioned on a jihadist website, shows one of two French men reading a statement, with a woman in between them. Four children sit on the ground near them, flanked by two masked militants wearing camouflage uniforms and holding rifles.

"We have been taken by Jama'atu Ahlis Sunna Lidda'awati wal-Jihad," one of the male hostages said in the video, referring to the name in Arabic of Nigeria's Boko Haram militants. "They want the liberation of their brothers in Cameroon and their women imprisoned in Nigeria."

The hostages were later identified as Tanguy Moulin-Fournier and his wife Albane, as well as their four sons, Eloi, Andeol, Mael and Clarence.

Tanguy's brother Cyril Moulin-Fournier was on vacation and with them at the time. The three adults are all around 40 years old. A third member of Boko Haram then reads in Arabic, saying the French had been taken in retribution for the French military intervention in Mali to stop the advance of militant Islamists towards the capital.

He adds that the group is demanding that its members be released from prisons in Cameroon and Nigeria, or the hostages will be killed. "Let the French president know that he has launched war against Islam and we are fighting him everywhere," the man says. "Let him know that we are spread everywhere to save our brothers."

A total of 15 French citizens are currently being held in western Africa. In addition to the seven kidnapped in Cameroon, there is one other in Nigeria and seven thought to be in northern Mali

The French gas group GDF Suez last week identified the captives as an employee working in the Cameroon capital of Yaoundé and his family. Cameroonian authorities believe the family, who were visiting Waza national park at the time, were taken over the border into Nigeria after their kidnapping.A local witness said he saw gunmen on motorcycles abduct the tourists on February 19. Soldiers from both countries continue to search for them in the border region between the two countries.

Boko Haram, which means "Western education is sacrilege", aims to impose Islamic law on Nigeria.

It has carried out frequent attacks on Nigerian Christians, and has been blamed for the deaths of at least 792 people last year.

The group is believed to be developing links to al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, an Algerian-based group that opened a front in Mali.

Source:  http://www.telegraph.co.uk/